Today, An E-Mail Is Testing Itself As An Application!

Today, An E-Mail Is Testing Itself As An Application!

– If e-mail is today the preferred means of communication for brands, Responsive Design technologies force marketing departments to take new constraints into account in order to ensure optimal reading on the different screens of our daily lives.

Yesterday, one of our favorite brands, to which we subscribed, sent us an e-mail with a 25% promo on some products available in store. We want to know more before moving to the store. Unfortunately, we cannot see the message correctly on our mobile. Worse still, on our tablet the images do not load. We have no choice but to re-light our computer to read the message, or wait till this evening to be at home to consult it! Who has never experienced such a situation, or at least has never faced an illegible e-mail? Raging, is not it?

The advent of smart phones and tablets has profoundly changed our habits of consumption, entertainment and access to information. We want fast, immediate, design, personalized. We are increasingly demanding in terms of user experience, in all fields. Even for a simple e-mail, we want an impeccable experience. The email, which seemed simple to conceive a few years ago, has been enriched and has had to reinvent itself, like all the other marketing tools to adapt to different supports and habits of consumption.

Time spent on smart phones and tablets increased by 56% between 2015 and 2016 in Europe and 16% of Internet traffic comes today from mobile. Mobile uses change the face of our consumption. One example is the explosion of push notifications that germinate on our phones to alert us to the slightest novelty, promotion or change in our daily lives. For e-mails, 72% of European mobile users visit their mobile phones every day in 2016, compared to 50% in 2015 (Source: SNCD). In passing, it should be noted that among the smart phone owners, 35% also own a tablet and among them 42% have replaced the computer by the tablet.

Same Like Content The e-mail is Also King

For a brand, e-mail is the preferred means of communicating directly with its users, whether for prospecting or customer loyalty. Globally, we estimate a little more than 400 commercial e-mails received by a user each month (Source: Return Path). In Europe, e-mail is the preferred channel for receiving communications (46%), even before the website (32%), paper mail (which drops to 10%), social networks (5%) , Mobile apps (2%), SMS (2%) and telephone (2%).

The stakes are such that it is now essential to heal and analyze his e-mailing campaigns. In recent years, many tools have been available to test the performance and deliverability of a newsletter, but how to ensure that the content is displayed optimally regardless of the terminal used?

Responsive e-mail, a solution

Today, 13% of Internet users encounter problems viewing their emails on smart phones. If they do not offer a reading adapted to their support, smart phone users delete these emails (70%) or unsubscribe directly (16%) (Source: Acxiom 2013).

“Responsive” e-mails respond perfectly to the problem of multi-devices: display content optimally whether you are on your smart phone, tablet or computer, or even on your TV. However, a Responsive email that displays correctly on your Samsung may experience a bug on your friend’s smart phone.

Specifically, the rendering of an e-mail depends essentially on the terminal and the application used to view it. Screen size, resolution, OS version, browser, e-mail client used, etc. Are characteristics that determine the presentation of content? It is then necessary to set up the organization and the tools adapted to the multi-device tests, to detect the main problems before sending and to correct them as soon as possible.

Tip 1: Precisely Target The Terminals

– Define a test sample representative of the target market and in accordance with the mobile uses

– Analyze the combinations resolution / size / OS

– Taking into account the specificities of each OS and version (ex: Safari by default on iOS vs native browser on part of the Android or Chrome)

Azhar Iqbal, with more than 15 years of programming experience, posses a firm command over system analysis, system design and custom software solutions. He envisioned utilizing his extensive experience and expertise to elucidate Telephony Applications Development and design more practical solutions. You can reach him through his website Ranking Solutions or LinkedIn Profile.